


Virtual Friends

by AntlersandFangs, Celtic_Lass



Series: Virtually Faded Universe [8]
Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms
Genre: Gen, It's just some useful background info for later in Virtually Torn, this will only make sense if you read Virtually Faded, uhhh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-26
Updated: 2020-01-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:53:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22426633
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AntlersandFangs/pseuds/AntlersandFangs, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Celtic_Lass/pseuds/Celtic_Lass
Summary: A pair of distant, really, really distant cousins meet at a family reunion, and find something special
Series: Virtually Faded Universe [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1486343
Comments: 9
Kudos: 78





	Virtual Friends

Valerie-Keen loved family reunions. They took her to interesting places, like right now they were in Ireland at Uncle Timothy’s place by the sea, and she got to see the family records updated with new births and adoptions and she got to meet her new cousins and pick up a few words of different languages. Adopted children had their branch painted blue, and blood children had their branch painted gold. Not that there was any difference between the two, but sometimes magic needed the memory of blood, so it was best to know, according to ma. Most of the tree was blue now, but there were two solid gold branches reaching all the way back to Beth and Del, and Valerie-Keen was proud to say she was the latest in the line of the gold branch reaching from Cody. 

There was another kid here that was a ‘gold brancher’, some kid named Esther from Mirwa’s line, and Valerie-Keen had been searching for her eagerly, wanting to meet her before she had to get back on the plane to Virginia. She didn’t know where Esther lived, but she wanted to at least exchange mailing addresses before they parted. They were the last of the ‘gold branchers’, they should stay in touch. 

Hopefully she was cool. 

She wove her way through the milling adults, enduring cheek pinches and comments about how tall she had grown, which was a pile of crap, she was the shortest person her age at home. She tracked down every kid she could, introducing herself and exchanging addresses. She had an awesome notebook she had pasted leaves on the cover that she carefully wrote down each address in, sometimes tracking down a parent if the cousin didn’t know theirs. 

But Esther was nowhere to be found. Maybe outside? Valerie-Keen dodged great-grandma Laure’s over long kisses and ran outside to look around. There were a few adults milling about, some of them grilling, some of them drinking, but it was less crowded and noisy out here. Most of the kids were inside where the TV and toys were, but if Esther was a loner she would probably be out here.

And… yes! There was a kid sitting on a bench, her chin resting on her fist and her feet swinging idly. Valerie-Keen ran towards her excitedly.

“Hi! I’m Valerie-Keen!”

The girl looked up with a shy smile. “Hi. I’m Esther Leanne Fowler.” 

Valerie-Keen felt the tingle of a true name and gaped at her. “Esther! You can’t just give out your true name like that! What if I was an evil witch! Or a fae!”

Esther laughed and rolled her eyes. “That’s just silly. Names are just names.”

“Names are names and names are names!” Valerie-Keen sat on the bench beside her, determined to talk sense into her. “You really shouldn’t just give your full name out. It ain’t safe. I got two middle names, and I keep both of them super secret.”

“Keen isn’t your middle name?”

“Oh, no. My first name is Valerie-Keen. It means brave and wise.” She said proudly before digging through her backpack and flipping through her book of baby names. “And Esther means…”

“Star. It’s from the Bible.” Esther looked curiously at the book. “Why do you carry around a baby name book?”

“Cool! Star. That’s pretty!” Valerie-Keen put away her the book, and then handed Esther one of the little cards of paper she had spent the entire plane flight writing her address on. “Names is important, you can tell a lot about a person by their name. Here, this is my mailing address. I live in Virginia in America, but can we write?”

Esther took the card with a smile. “Sure. Pen pals? I live in America too. Tennessee.” 

“Awesome!” Valerie-Keen held out the notebook and pen to her. “Maybe I can talk ma into driving me out your way sometime.” 

“It might be easier for me to talk mine into driving your way.” Esther said, her lip between her teeth as she carefully wrote her address down. “I’m homeschooled, so I can go on trips and just take my work with me.”

Valerie-Keen felt a thrill of excitement, both at the thought of being able to learn wherever you wanted, as well as the fact that Esther was actually interested in being friends. “That is so cool! I’m stuck in classes all day most of the year and they’re so  _ boring _ . I wanna be a midwife when I grow up, so I gotta get good grades and stuff, so I do a lot of extra studying on the side.”

Esther looked up with an excited smile. “That’s really cool! I want to be a nurse! I’m doing advanced science and health to help give me a head start. I’m two grades ahead already.”

“Wow.” Valerie-Keen was really, really happy she had found her fellow ‘gold brancher’. She was so cool! “I’m doing that too! I ain’t ahead a grade or nothing, but I have…” She dug back through her backpack and came up with her dog eared and grass stained field guide. “I got a book of useful plants and shit.”

Esther gasped, her eyes wide. “You-! You swore!”

“Well… yeah. I ain’t a  _ baby _ !”

“It’s not being a baby to keep your language clean!” Esther flushed.

Oh, right, if she was one of the religious types… “Sorry. I didn’t mean that. I’ll… try not to swear in front of ya if it bothers you.” 

“It does.” Esther lifted her chin, like she was trying to be brave.

“Okay. I might forget cuz we swear all the time at school, but if I mess up jus’ tell me.” Valerie-Keen said in determination.

Esther looked at her curiously. “Most… most kids just laugh at me when I…”

“Most kids are mean.” Valerie-Keen took her address book back with a firm nod. “Ma says we should be respectful of others beliefs, even if they ain’t our own or seem silly. People’s beliefs are important to them, and so should be important to us. Mutual respect.”

“You’re really… smart. How old are you? Seven?”

“I’m nine!” Valerie-Keen said indignantly. “I’ze just short!”

Esther grinned. “I’m nine too! And I’m short too. Dad says that I got it from my…” She started counting off on her fingers. “Great, great, great, great… I can never remember how many greats it is.... But from Ancestor Loaise’s husband. He was supposedly really short.” 

“I got it from Ancestor Adelle. She was French.” Valerie-Keen muttered. “It’s no fair that everyone else got the tall side of things.” 

“Yeah.” Esther said glumly. “Mom says that guys like short girls, but boys are gross and I think that’s a stupid reason to be happy with how tall I am.”

“Well, yeah, that’s a stupid reason. We shouldn’t have to like anything cuz a boy likes it. We’re short, and that means we’re tall enough to kidney punch. That’s a much better reason than cuz a  _ boy _ likes it.” Valerie-Keen said sagely.

Esther blushed again. “I don’t know how to punch. I know if I do it wrong I could break my thumb or wrist, so I haven’t tried.”

Valerie-Keen gasped in horror. “That’s awful! Here! I’ll teach you!” She set aside her book bag and stood up, pulling her new friend to her feet. 

Esther was a fast study, and after a while they were both sweaty and hot from learning to punch, then to throw someone, then how to kick properly. Esther collapsed onto the ground with a sigh. “This is so cool, but I’m hot.”

“Wanna go swim? The beach ain’t far.”

“Sure. Let me go ask my mom.” Esther started to sit up.

“Nah, there’s adults all over, I’ll just shout at the nearest one.” Valerie-Keen looked around and saw one of their cousins or uncles or whatever and waved her hand to get his attention. “Hey! Valerie-Keen and Esther are going to swim at the beach!”

The relative gave her a thumbs up and Valerie-Keen grinned at Esther and grabbed her hand to haul her to her feet. “There. We can go now.” 

“But…”

“Better to ask forgiveness than permission.” 

Esther scrunched up her face doubtfully, but let her pull her along. “That sounds backwards to me. Wouldn’t it be better to ask than to have to apologize?

“Nah, cuz you still got to do the thing even if you have to apologize. Uh, what did da call it? Plausible deniability? Nobody  _ said _ we couldn’t go swim.”

“I… feel like you are going to get me in trouble a lot.”

“Probably.” Valerie-Keen said unrepentantly. 

The water was cold, so they didn’t actually swim, instead just rolling their pants up and wading in the water, collecting cool rocks and shells. A bright glimmer beneath the water caught Esther’s attention and she called Valerie-Keen over.

“Hey! Look at this! It’s pretty far in though.” 

Valerie-Keen looked at the shining and began pulling her sweater off, laying it on top of her book bag. “I’ll get it.” She took a deep, bracing breath, and jumped into the cold water with a shriek at the temperature. 

It was pretty far out and she had to dive down to reach it, digging it out of the sand and bringing it back up. It felt warm in her hand and glowed so brightly it seemed like she was holding a star. “Esther! Come look!” She was shivering and cold but the light was so beautiful and she just had to share it with her friend, let her see how pretty it was. 

They stared at the beautiful, magical stone until Valerie-Keen’s hands started to shake with her shivering. “We… need to get you warm.” Esther breathed, entranced by the stone.

“After. I have an- an idea.” Her teeth were chattering as she slowly moved to her bag and dug through it to find the chisel she had picked up from Uncle Timothy’s garage shortly after they arrived.

“What are you going to do?” Esther asked, still cradling the stone in her hands.

“I’m gonna split it, half for you, half for me. We can make friendship necklaces. It seems like the best thing to do with a magical stone we found together.”

“Magic isn’t real.” But Esther sounded like she didn’t quite believe her own words as she stared at the glowing stone. 

“Sure.” Valerie-Keen gently took the stone and set it on a rock, placing the chisel exactly over it, and lifting another rock. She blew out a breath, lifted the rock, and swung it as hard as she could at the chisel.

The light flared in a loud, brilliant, trilling noise, washing over them both and seeming to sink into their skin. They gasped, and the light seemed to flow in with their breath, tingling and rushing. Valerie-Keen reached for Esther at the same time she reached for her, and they clasped hands in awe as the light swirled around them, and then slowly disappeared into them. Valerie-Keen saw Esther’s eyes flash silver for just an instant, and then the light was gone.

The stone lay in two perfect halves between them, clear and pretty, but no longer glowing. 

“Woah.”

“Your eyes were gold for a moment.” Esther said breathlessly.

“Yours was silver.” Valerie-Keen squeezed her hands, feeling like this was super, super important. “They ain’t gonna believe us.”

“No. they won’t.” Esther looked down at the stone and let out an awed breath. “I… it was so beautiful.”

Valerie-Keen let go of one of her hands and reached down to pick up the halves of the stone. “Half for you, half for me.”

“Friends. Forever.” Esther said quietly as she picked a half and clutched it tightly in her hand. 

“Friends forever.” 

Esther’s mom had not believed her, Valerie-Keen had watched as she tried to show her the stone but had been just been praised for ‘her wonderful imagination’ and ‘glad you found a friend, sweetie’. But she had also seen the way Esther’s father had gently taken the now clear stone from her hand, turning it over with a wistful smile before offering to help them fit the halves with a chain. Silver for Esther, and Gold for her. Da had believed them of course, Ma too.

Ma had put a hand on their shoulders and had sighed, her eyes distant. “You…” She blinked back tears and stepped back. “You kids go run and play while you can.” 


End file.
